Case study Covering all the angles of disaster recovery planning Like all the Ferranti systems and solutions hosted in the Colt data centre, the NOC has redundancy built in to guard against, for example, a problem with an individual server. When the company decided to extend that disaster recovery capability with a resilient, dual–data centre approach, it initially considered doing so by installing equipment in Colt's Amsterdam data centre. "But we really wanted to avoid capital outlay on hardware," explains Mr. Baert. So Ferranti opted instead for Colt's Enterprise Cloud, a VMware vCloud® Data Center Service. "It's an elegantly designed solution, based on a reliable virtualisation platform and top-quality hardware, that we pay for on a usage basis," explains Mr. Baert. "We have complete control over our computing resources, but we don't have to worry about things like server maintenance, patching or failover exercises – Colt takes care of all of that." Cloud computing that inspires trust The Enterprise Cloud service is hosted in a second Colt data centre , giving Ferranti the dual–data centre resilience it wanted. The two locations are Ferranti gains peace of mind without capital investment Customer name Ferranti Computer Systems Business Systems integrator Sector Technology Challenge To add extra resilience to critical operational systems and customer solutions without capital investment. Solution Colt Managed Services Products and services Enterprise Cloud, LANLink Belgium-based systems integrator Ferranti Computer Systems provides managed IT solutions that its customers rely on every day. These range from networks, infrastructure and desktop productivity services, to smart metering and customer information systems for energy and utility companies. "Our customers use our solutions 24/7 for critical business activities – they can't afford a moment's downtime," explains Frederik Baert, Director of Professional Services for Ferranti's ICT division. "That means our network operations centre must be permanently available, so that we can monitor and manage the health of our customers' solutions round the clock." Ferranti houses its network operations centre (NOC) in Colt's data centre in Brussels, along with other systems and solutions, including its infrastructure-as-a-service platform that's used by around 20 of its customers. Colt has been providing Ferranti with data centre colocation and connectivity and a range of managed services in a partnership that dates back several years. Enterprise Cloud makes a dual–data centre approach to disaster recovery quick to set up and easy to scale.